Al Ain, and Douglas, left to rue wastefulness in Asian Champions League stumble

Defensive lapses prove costly as Qatari side head home from Garden City with all three Asian Champions League points.

Douglas of Al Ain shown during an Arabian Gulf League match against Al Wasl last month. Satish Kumar / The National / January 22, 2016

AL AIN // So Al Ain's bid for a second Asian Champions League crown begins with defeat, another regrettable result for the UAE this week, another disappointing display in the first round of the continent's elite club competition.

Just like Al Nasr and Al Jazira before them, Al Ain emerged from their group opener with zero points, beaten 2-1 at the Hazza bin Zayed Stadium by Qatar’s El Jaish.

A clean sweep for the Emirates, but not as they would have wanted it.

Al Ain were expected to offer a quick reprieve. They are the reigning UAE champions. Its only previous winners of the tournament, supposedly its best chance of a repeat this season.

But they came unstuck on their Group D bow and in front of their fans, giving away two goals through slack defending and wasting a number of presentable chances. It left Zlatko Dalic struggling for answers.

“I don’t know what I can tell you about this game,” the Al Ain coach said. “I can’t explain how many chances we missed, clear chances, we tried to do everything. Only one message from my side: never give up.”

Indeed, Al Ain’s fight, their determination to drag themselves back into the game, was perhaps the only positive.

After a first-half bookended by goals from Abderrazak Hamdallah and Romarinho, both born from Al Ain’s lack of focus, the hosts poured forward but could only half the deficit.

Al Ain controlled and thus created plenty, but simply lacked a killer edge on what was their first Champions League outing post-Asamoah Gyan.

Shorn of the Ghanaian goal-guarantor, the tournament’s top scorer two years ago and the most celebrated foreign player in the club’s history, they found the net only once when it should have easily been more.

Douglas, the January signing, represents the second attempt at filling the void, the Brazilian tasked to succeed where Emmanuel Emenike was adjudged to have failed.

Yet he departed his Champions League debut with Al Ain burdened by the ire of the home support. Douglas scored a penalty after missing from the spot minutes before, although he had already fired his initial effort high into the net when the referee requested a retake.

This time, his shot was saved.

However, Douglas thumped home his third spot-kick and was then presented the chance to be the hero when minutes from time he took aim at the entire Jaish goal. Six yards out and unmarked, he somehow blazed over the bar.

With it, Al Ain’s hope of a draw disappeared.

It is now two defeats on the bounce, coming shortly after Thursday’s 2-1 reverse to Al Shabab, when Al Ain relinquished top spot in the Arabian Gulf League.

Douglas will bear the brunt, but the team are not performing.

“Today, this guy missed many chances, fantastic chances, but this is football,” Dalic said. “We need to get back to winning ways. Three days ago before Shabab, my team and I were the best, and now we’re down. Now all we need is to work hard and come back.”

Al Ain fans left only after they had vented their frustration. Dalic, though, remains defiant.

“Always I am have full confidence, always I trust my team,” he said. “I don’t know now what I can say against my players. I’m coach, I’m responsible for everything.

“For everything, I take responsibility and I will stay behind my players. If somebody needs to pay price for the loss, I’m ready.”

Iranians thrash Al Jazira

Al Jazira were given a rude awakening in the Asian Champions League, being beaten soundly by Tractor Sazi of Iran 4-0 in their Group C opener.

The game slipped out of Jazira’s control in the first nine minutes following early strikes from Bakhtiar Rahmani and Shojae Khalilzadeh.

Mehdi Sharifi, a second-half substitute, and Rahmani then found the net within five minutes of the break to double the lead and put the game beyond Jazira’s reach.

“We were put under pressure from the two early goals and then we couldn’t recover,” Jazira captain and goalkeeperAli Kasheif said. “It was just a bad day for us on the pitch.

“Now we have to look ahead. We are still not out of this competition but we are left with a lot of hard work ahead of the next game.”

In the other game in the same group, a late strike from Davronbek Khasimov salvaged a 2-2 draw for the Uzbek side Pakhtakor over Al Hilal of Saudi Arabia.

-- Amith Passela

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